9.06.2010

Titty Flash!

I carefully considered whether or not to do another post about titties. But then I decided, hey, you can never have too many posts about titties.

My decision to do a follow-up started with an anonymous comment on my last post which pointed out that women in France don’t go topless everywhere - only on the beaches and not “on the sidewalks of Paris.”

I appreciate the comment, but I’m afraid that the commenter sorely underestimates the French in general - and the Parisians in particular - when it comes to their nonchalance over the public display of titties. Every summer since 2002, the French have poured patches of sand out along the banks of the Seine in order to construct a summertime attraction known as “Paris-Plage” or “ParisBeach.” However, the city of Paris had to enact a ban on topless sunbathing because “Parisians found it perfectly normal to disport themselves in the city center as if they were in St. Tropez.”

Ah, the French. They care so little about showing their titties that they have to enact laws reminding them that it’s not always the right time to show their titties.

I was further encouraged by an email I got from Jennifer over at Early Morning Fog, Partial Clearing. Jennifer not only has the world’s most awesome name, but she also has a fantastic blog, and it was she who alerted me to the latest titty controversy here in the good ol’ USA.

This controversy revolves around teenage girls wearing breast cancer-awareness bracelets to school that say, “I (heart) boobies.” The bracelets are sold through a group called Keep-A-Breast, whose goal is to raise cancer awareness among younger girls. Many people think that breast cancer is a disease that only affects older women, but breast cancer is the most deadly cancer among women under the age of forty. Keep-A-Breast takes an edgy, arty, more youth-oriented approach towards raising breast cancer awareness, and profits from the sale of these bracelets go to cancer research.

Sounds great, right? But everything comes to a screeching halt, apparently, once the word “boobies” is involved. School officials all over the nation are banning students from wearing the bracelet because of the offending word. Some school officials have said that the word “boobies” has a sexual connotation that is inappropriate for a school environment. Other school officials have said that female students wearing the bracelets leave themselves open to sexual harassment by male students.

Seriously? A boy sexually harasses a girl in school for wearing a cancer awareness bracelet, and our reaction is to tell the girl that she can’t wear the bracelet anymore? For reals? Whoa. Can you say mandatory sensitivity training?

But what about that “sexual connotation” bit? I had a conversation with a guy who said that he understood where the school officials were coming from. He said, “Breasts are sexual things. It might be tough for teenage boys to get past the fact that teenage girls are wearing bracelets that say ‘boobies’ on them, regardless of the context.”

Maybe men have a more difficult time understanding all of the complexities behind the female breast because their experience with female breasts is largely one-dimensional and revolves around sex. So while women understand that their breasts have requirements that go beyond the sexual - think breast feeding and mammograms - maybe the words “booby,” and “titty” only hit that one, sexy note for the men.

But this makes me wonder what words women are supposed to use when we want to talk about our breasts in a non-sexual, non-clinical way.

I thought a good benchmark might be whether or not you are allowed to say the word “boobies” or “titties” on television. I was somewhat surprised to learn that the FCC doesn’t have a list of words banned from the tube. George Carlin has a list of seven:

The FCC? Not so much. Their rules simply state that you can’t use words that “describe or depict sexual and excretory organs and activities.” However, if the word in question isn’t used in a sexual context, then it’s allowable. Thus, when Bono said on live TV that it was “fucking brilliant” to win a Golden Globe, the FCC didn’t fine him because the word “fuck” wasn’t meant sexually.

So by this standard, those “I (heart) boobies” bracelets should be okay, right? Because they’re talking about titties in a public health and awareness sort of way, not in a sexy sort of way.

So come on. Let those girls wear their bracelets, whydoncha?

Because I gotta say, there’s nothing very sexy about the words “booby” or “titty” anyway. These are whimsical words, not erotic ones.

7 comments:

My eternal contrariness can't help noting that I know 8 year old boys who delightedly wear the bracelet not because of its health message but because "I heart boobies" is the ultimate in cool and uber sexy among the under 12 set.

That said---Who the heck cares? It hurts no one. I didn't go out and buy my 8 year old one (though he has hinted that I should.) but neither would I keep him from wearing it should he manage to get his hands on one.

Kym, I hate to undermine your parental authority, but is it possible that your eight-year-old likes the bracelet because he hearts the kind of boobies Jonny is talking about? Because if that's the case, I think you need to order him one of these bracelets right away. The boobies need all the love they can get.

Annie, I'll gladly take credit for the "ridiculous" part of this blog post, but I have to again give credit to Neruda for the "sublime" part. You're right; that poem is just breathtaking.

We had an incident at the Benbow Inn a few years back in which a woman was asked to leave the restaurant because she was breastfeeding. Turns out there's a California law which allows for breastfeeding in any public business when she is "authorized to be present." Not the best written law.

I have no problem with women who want to go topless, or bottomless for that matter. But I was raised in loose California and the majority of people unfortunately feel differently. While I feel that a woman should be free to be herself, I don't think the in-your-face approach is productive.

I do agree that if women aren't allowed to go topless, nobody should be allowed to go topless.

I have heard objections to breast-feeding in public as inappropriately "sexually provocative." I have to wonder at those who are sexually provoked by the sight of a baby attached to a breast. I find that thought infinitely more disturbing than anything the woman is doing.

I do react sexually to the sight of breasts, although I react even more when breasts are partially covered. Maybe it's about setting off the imagination? And I react sexually to legs, arms, and just about every other part of a woman, so whether it's "sexual" is of no consequence. I'm a guy, and, well, that's what we do. All we can do really is just try to prevent our reaction from being someone else's problem.

This is a key culture-war issue, and I do think we owe a bit of respect to those who were raised differently, not so much that we restrict our own freedom to the point that we have to bury who we are, but just that we have some consideration that there are people who think about and experience life differently from the way we in the cultural greenbelt do.

I tried to make the point with humor in my old post on the Benbow subject, and managed to offend everybody including the woman and the restaurant owners. All have since forgiven me after my apologies. I suggested that the waiter handled the matter badly (he did) which offended him and I suggested that maybe the request itself wasn't unreasonable given that people from different cultural milieus might have complained (turns out the request is deemed unreasonable by California law). Live and learn.

Eric, I'm glad you tried to tackle this topic with humor, even if you got knocked around for it. You're absolutely right - respectful behavior is the key to it all, isn't it? Swallowtail, I'm glad you liked the Neruda. Sigh indeed!